(Bloomberg) At least 150 people were killed in Syria yesterday, al Jazeera reported, as soldiers sought to reassert control over a restive nation in one of the deadliest bouts of violence since the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad began more than four months ago.

The army took action the day before the start of Ramadan, the Muslim month of fasting and prayer. Tanks shelled Hama, Syria’s fourth-largest city, where at least 113 people were killed, the Qatari-based television network said, citing the National Organization for Human Rights in Syria.

The regime “has been very frightened by Ramadan’s onset,” Joshua Landis, a Syria specialist who directs the Center for Middle East Studies at the University of Oklahoma in Norman, said in a telephone interview.

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is “deeply concerned” by the reports of killings in Syria, his office said in a statement yesterday. The U.S., France, Turkey and the U.K. joined Ban in condemning the violence.

This does not sound like the multiple party changes that Assad promised. The protesters seem to be fans of Donkeys. Maybe they are cheering for Obama?

(Bloomberg) At least 150 people were killed in Syria yesterday, al Jazeera reported, as soldiers sought to reassert control over a restive nation in one of the deadliest bouts of violence since the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad began more than four months ago.The army took action the day before the start of Ramadan, the Muslim month of fasting and prayer. Tanks shelled Hama, Syria’s fourth-largest city, where at least 113 people were killed, the Qatari-based television network said, citing the National Organization for Human Rights in Syria.The regime “has been very frightened by Ramadan’s onset,” Joshua Landis, a Syria specialist who directs the Center for Middle East Studies at the University of Oklahoma in Norman, said in a telephone interview.United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is “deeply concerned” by the reports of killings in Syria, his office said in a statement yesterday. The U.S., France, Turkey and the U.K. joined Ban in condemning the violence.

The resignations of Turkey’s Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the commanders of the Army, Navy and Air Force, may symbolize the end of the Turkish military’s power in the country’s government.

“This is effectively the end of the military’s role in Turkish democracy,” said Asli Aydintasbas, a columnist for the Turkish daily newspaper Milliyet. “This is the symbolic moment where the first Turkish republic ends and the second republic begins.”

The resignations of Turkey’s Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the commanders of the Army, Navy and Air Force, may symbolize the end of the Turkish military’s power in the country’s government.

“This is effectively the end of the military’s role in Turkish democracy,” said Asli Aydintasbas, a columnist for the Turkish daily newspaper Milliyet. “This is the symbolic moment where the first Turkish republic ends and the second republic begins.”

Muslim countries can’t handle freedom… arresting their leaders only to replace them with Islam friendly generals.

The resignations were the culmination of a year of frustrations, in which more than 40 generals — approximately a tenth of the senior military command — were taken into custody, an assault that has infuriated the military but left it essentially helpless to fight back.

“This was their last resort,” Ms. Aydintasbas said of the resignations. “It is happening precisely because there is no likelihood of a coup. There is nothing else for them to do.”

Twoanalysts have raised the possibility that the resignations are preparations for a military coup, but that appears unlikely with so many officers imprisoned. One report even claimed that Kosaner’s resignation was forced by Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Turkey is not headed toward a more democratic government. It is headed toward a more Islamist one.

This is the first time in the history of the republic that we are seeing something like this,” said Gursel Tekin, vice president of the main opposition political party, who was speaking in the seaside city of Canakkale. “Honestly, this situation is not good.

Stoltenberg used his speech to announce that the government has best provide another 100 million in aid to Palestine. 63 million will go through the UN, the rest through the Red Cross and other volunteer organizations….Stoltenberg also pointed out that Norway has gone further than other countries in allowing Hamas to have contact with Norwegian officials, and emphasized that the criticism against Israel weakened if they don’t set clear requirements for both parties. There he [Stoltenberg] greeted the international guests and got a t-shirt with “Tear down the wall” by Hassan Faraj from the Fatah Youth. Even if Fatah and Hamas are political rivals, [Stoltenberg] believes that Norway should provide support for the new Palestinian government. Palestine had democratic elections[????]. …and there are normal political parties in Palestine that are a resistance against occupation, said Faraj to Adresseavisen. Faraj appreciates the financial aid, and believes the Norwegian policy towards Palestine is to some extent positive. We feel that Sweden and Norway will help us more than other European countries, said Faraj.

Oslo, 2006. Miriam Shomrat, Israel’s Ambassador to Norway, was incensed. And with good reason.

In September that year, a month after Oslo’s Jewish cemetery was vandalised, and just before Rosh Hashanah, three individuals in a passing car (later identified as two Islamists and an accomplice called Kristiansen), fired a volley of 13 shots at the synagogue. The building’s facade was damaged, although luckily no one was hurt.

The attack came shortly after the government of Jens Stoltenberg (who of course has been very much in the public eye this past week, and has visited a mosque to show his solidarity with his country’s Muslims) ruled that security cameras monitoring the approaches to the synagogue in Oslo must be removed.

Likening the attack on the synagogue to terrorism (a court verdict disagreed, by the way, finding merely that “serious vandalism” had occurred), Miriam Shomrat observed, before the perpetrators (who had, it would transpire, planned to bomb the Israeli and American embassies and to kidnap and decapitate her) were discovered:

“We don’t know who’s doing this, whether it’s Norwegians or foreigners. But the fact that there’s been an increase [in attacks] and that it’s happening in Oslo must be taken very seriously by the political community.”

Diplomatic or not, in a television interview she made some pointed remarks about the fact that not a single message of sympathy had been forthcoming from the country’s Royal Family, and blamed a former prime minister, Kåre Willoch (wrongly identified in the following video as “Kurk Witnak”) for contributing to the climate of antisemitism in Norway, and also criticised bestselling author Jostein Gaarder.

Willoch, a Conservative, and a fierce critic of Israeli policy towads the Palestinian Arabs, had in May 2006 invited Hamas official Atef Adwan to a private lucheon; Willoch would subsequently be accused of antisemitism by the Wall Street Journal for observing of President Obama’s appointment of Rahm Emanuel: “It does not look too promising, he has chosen a chief of staff who is Jewish,” a remark also condemned by Alan Dershowitz.

Gaarder, during Israel’s operations against Hizbollah in southern Lebanon, had in an op-ed in the newspaper Aftenposten entitled “God’s Chosen People” described Judaism as “an archaic national and warlike religion” and noted that Christianity promotes “compassion and forgiveness”. He claimed that many Israelis rejoiced at the deaths of Lebanese children, just as the biblical Israelites celebrated the plagues a wrathful Deity inflicted upon Egypt.

“We laugh at this people’s whims, and cry over its misdeeds. To act as God’s chosen people is not only foolish and arrogant, it is a crime against humanity. We call it racism…. We laugh with embarrassment at those who still believe that the god of the flora, fauna and galaxies has chosen one particular people as his favorite, and given them amusing stone tablets, burning bushes and a license to kill….

We no longer recognize the State of Israel. We could not recognize the apartheid regime of South Africa, nor did we recognize the Afghani Taliban regime. Then there were many who did not recognize Saddam Hussein’s Iraq or the Serbs’ ethnic cleansing. We need to get used to the idea: The State of Israel, in its current form, is history.

The State of Israel has raped the recognition of the world and shall have no peace until it lays down its arms.”

Ambassador Shomrat’s remarks were denounced the following day by Norwegian Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Støre, of whom we’ve also been seeing a lot in recent days.

Sniffed Støre, who has shown time and again that he is no friend to Israel:

“In the first place an ambassador from another country ought to know that the Royal Family can never respond to such remarks. And anyway she should also know that it is the government that expresses the view of the Norwegian authorities.

What she is doing is to make criticisms of something that must be interpreted as a lack of sympathy with what happened last week. I think this is an unsuitable remark for an ambassador from another country in Norway.”